"Telling" Vs. "Showing" - Part 1

Telling Vs. Showing - Part 1

         “Show don’t tell” is an oft repeated statement that makes new writers go “huh?” While it’s easy to state that a good writer should make the scene come alive for the reader, most writers just starting out, find it difficult to understand what exactly is being expected of them.

         After scouring a lot of material on this subject, I have put together a list of the elements that the writer, unwittingly, uses to “tell” instead of “show.” These are the mistakes that most writers make and are easy enough to correct, once you know where you are going wrong. I’m sure some editors even refer to such a list and use it to accept or reject work.

1.Too simply put – The simplest form of ‘telling’ is blandly writing that someone is frightened or someone is crying or someone is laughing. This is done quite unknowingly and is the most common of mistakes made.

The best way to catch these mistakes is to run a find function for past tense verbs like ran, cried, laughed, smiled and replace them with visual descriptors.

E.g. Instead of She was frightened, use Blood curdled in her veins and her heart thumped with the beat of a hundred tribal drums as  she waited in the dark.

E.g. Instead of She laughed aloud, use She threw up her head and laughed in short barks.

If you noticed, the second phrases in each of the examples bring to mind a picture of what is really happening. This is what the critics write about as vivid imagery.

Also, felt and looked are words that really need to be watched. If you need to tell the reader how someone felt or looked, you are not really doing a good job. Instead describe what is being felt or how someone looked.

E.g. Instead of She looked angry, rephrase as Her face contorted into a scowl and eyes narrowed as she watched Peter approach.

E.g. Instead of He felt sad, rephrase as He stared mindlessly at the wall; memories of their time together came rushing back, mocking him with their happiness.

You will notice that in both the examples the word sad or angry is not mentioned and yet you know that, in the first case, the woman looked angry and, in the second case, the man was sad.

2. Use the right verb instead of adverbs– The suffix “-ly” is generally used in conjunction with a verb or an adjective and is used to strengthen them. Such words are called adverbs. When used in fiction, they tend to weaken the description. Words like quickly, gently, slowly are adverbs used to describe the action taking place. Here again, the writer is only telling the reader how someone walked or talked rather than showing him.

In general, the use of adverbs is frowned upon as an example of bad writing. Read through your work to identify these adverbs and replace them with a strong and more appropriate verb or noun. Odds are that you weren’t using the right verb in the first place.

E.g. She walked quickly should be rephrased as She hurried or She rushed.

If you notice, we have replaced a more apt verb "hurried" for a verb-adverb combination - "walked quickly". The new verb not only conveys the right meaning but also does it more effectively.       
E.g. She ate her food quickly should be rewritten as She gulped her food.

This, however, doesn't mean that one should do away with adverbs completely. When used judiciously, they enhance the writing.

3. Driver’s license description – Most writers tend to give descriptions of their characters by describing them and their vital statistics. Some others try and do it using mirrors (the character is standing in front of a mirror observing herself. Who really does that?) or having a third character describe them. These are amateurish ways of describing a character and are another way of ‘telling’ the reader what the character looks like rather than ‘showing.’ The best way to describe a character would be to work the description into the story.

E.g. Instead of saying He had blonde hair , rephrase as He sauntered towards her, the wind ruffling his blonde hair.

This way, you are not stopping the reader in his tracks to describe the character, but are doing so in the course of events.

4. How was that “Said”? Another oft repeated mistake is qualifying the word “said” when conveying dialogue. This is another mistake that editors look out for as a sign of an amateur writer. She said angrily, he said softly, she said loudly etc are commonly used, as writers find themselves uncomfortable with the use of a simple “said”. This is, again, a mistake as you are trying to tell the reader how he or she spoke rather than letting the dialogue itself convey the emotion.

E.g. Instead of “How dare you?” she said angrily, rephrase as “How dare you?” she said, banging her hands on the table.

The idea is to “show” how angry she was by describing how she looked or how she spoke.

5. Unnecessarily excessive – Some adverbs are used superfluously and can be completely done away with as they don’t convey anything new. It is either unnecessary or it is excessive. There is no point in reiterating.

E.g. totally flabbergasted is one word too many. Flabbergasted itself means totally stunned or amazed and doesn’t need the addition of the word ‘totally’ to describe it.

E.g. Hugely gigantic shows the unnecessary use of either hugely or gigantic.


6. Too many adjectives spoil the tale – Like adverbs, the excessive use of adjectives means that you are taking the easy way out. Used judiciously, adjectives convey descriptions crisply. However, some writers take the shortcut to description by using a single adjective to tell rather than show how powerful or beautiful or fastidious someone was. Though it may mean the use of more words, it’s always better to describe rather than simply say – He was powerful. Words like powerful, flexible, sophisticated are better described rather than blandly put across to the reader.

Also, a lot of adjectives are used unnecessarily. Adjectives like mere, basic, essential, major and fundamental are best done away with completely. They are used, almost unconsciously by us and are cliched ways of expressing thoughts.

In conclusion, writing is something that should be allowed to flow from pen to paper very naturally. But once that natural flow is complete and a writer sits down to edit, the above mentioned pointers will help him/her improve upon the narrative.

More often than not, the writer actually sees the images of his/her story in his/her own head but just assumes that the reader too sees them.

In this section, I have dealt with the identification of "tell". In the next part, I would be describing the ways of builing the description into your writing.

The Second part of this article - "Invalid Item" 

The End

Bibliography

Barron's Essentials of English, 4th Edition by Vincent F. Hopper; Cedric Gale; Ronald C. Foote; Benjamin W. Griffith
Writing Well, 5th Edition by William Zinsser
Self-Editing For Fiction Writers by Renni Browne and Dave King
Limiting Adjectives, Adverbs, etc. by Al Rocheleau
Show and Tell by Rogenna W. Brewer